Opinion: New information raises questions about potential FBI leaks

by Boris Epshteyn, Chief Political Analyst

FILE - In this Dec. 15, 2017, file photo, President Donald Trump sits with Attorney General Jeff Sessions during the FBI National Academy graduation ceremony in Quantico, Va. Trump’s White House counsel personally lobbied Attorney General Jeff Sessions to not recuse himself from the Justice Department’s investigation into potential ties between Russia and the Trump campaign. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

EDITOR'S NOTE: Boris Epshteyn formerly served as a Senior Advisor to the Trump Campaign and served in the White House as Special Assistant to The President and Assistant Communications Director for Surrogate Operations.

WASHINGTON (Sinclair Broadcast Group) - I have spoken to you before about text messages between FBI agent Peter Strzok and FBI attorney Lisa Page. Strzok was a senior counterintelligence official and a leader of both the Clinton email probe and Russia investigations.

The initial batch of messages released late last year show that Strzok and Page systematically expressed great disdain for then-candidate Donald Trump.

According to reports from The Hill based on review of further text messages between the two, Strzok and Page also may have been leaking information to the media.

One series of texts centers on pretending to stumble onto an article that they both knew would come out.

This does not by itself prove that a leak occurred, but it does point to FBI employees having advance knowledge of an unpublished media report.

In another text, Page complains that an article in the Washington Post was too specific for her taste because to quote, “….I didn’t have specific information to give.”

The House Intel Committee, chaired by Congressman Devin Nunes of California, is going to interview Peter Strzok and Lisa Page and others at the FBI and Department of Justice.

Here is the bottom line: we obviously do not know the whole story here. It is vital that our elected officials in Congress, as well as the Department of Justice’s Inspector General, determine and make public whether civil servants at the FBI were leaking information to the media. President Trump has repeatedly spoken about damaging leaks from within our law enforcement, national security apparatus as well as the Obama and Trump administrations. These latest revelations, if true, underscore those concerns.